Jap Herron: A Novel Written from the Ouija Board, With an Introduction, the Coming of Jap Herron

by Emily Grant Hutchings

TAP HERRON; A NOVEL WRITTEN FROM THE OUIJA BOARD WITH AN INTRODUCTION - 1917 - ON the afternoon of the second Thursday in March, 1915, I responded to an invitation to the regular meeting of a small psychical research society. There was to be a lecture on cosmic relations, and the hostess for the afternoon, whom I had met twice socially, thought I might be interested, my name having ap peared in connection with a recently detailed series of psychic experiments. To all those present, with the exception of the hostess, I was a total stranger. I learned, with some surprise, that these men and women had been meeting, with an occasional break of a few months, for more than five years. The record of these meetings filled several type-written volumes. When word came that the lecturer was unavoidably detained, the hostess requested Mrs. Lola V. Hays to entertain the members and guests by a demonstration of her ability to transmit spirit messages by means of a planchette and n lettered board. The apparatus was familiar to me but the outcome of that afternoons experience revealed a new use for the transmission board. After several messages, more or less personal, had been spelled out, the pointer of the planchette traced the words Samuel L. Clemens, lazy Sam. There was a long pause, and then Well, why dont some of you say something I was born in Hannibal, and my pulses quickened. I wanted to put a host of questions to the greatest humorist and the greatest philosopher of modern times but I was an outsider, unacquainted with the usages of the club, and I remained silent while the planchette continued Say, folks, dont knock my memoirs too hard. They were written when Mark Twain was dead to all senseof decency. When brains are soft, the method should be anasthesia. Not one of those present had read Mark Twains memoirs, and the plaint fell upon barren soil. The arrival of the lecturer prevented further confession from the unseen communicant but I was so deeply impressed that I begged my hostess to permit r. le to come again. For my benefit a meeting was arranged at which there was no lecturer, and I was asked to sit for the first time with Mrs. Hays. In my former psychic investigation, it had been my habit to pronounce the letters as the pointer of the planchette indicated them, and Mrs. Hays urged me to render the same service when I sat with her, because she never permitted herself to look at the board, fearing that her own mind would interfere with the transmission. Scarcely had our finger-tips touched the planchette when it darted to the letters which spelled the words I tried to write a romance once, and the little wife laughed at it. I still think i t is good stuff and I want it written. The plot is simple. Youd best skeletonize the plot. Solly Jenks, Hiram Wall-young men. Time, before the Civil War. Then the outline of a typical Mark Twain story came in short, explosive sentences. It was entitled, Up the Furrow to Fortune. A brief account of its coming seems vital to the more sustained work which was destined to follow it. I was not present a t the next regular meeting of the society but at its close I was summoned to the telephone and informed that Mark Twain had come again and had said that the Hannibal girl was the one for whom he and Mrs. Hays had been waiting. When they asked him what he meant, the planchette made reply Consult your record for 1911. One of the earlyvolumes of the societys record was brought forth, and a curious fact that all the members of the society had forgotten was unearthed. About a year after his passing out, Mr. Clemens had told Mrs...

236 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1917

About the author

Did Mark Twain dictate a book via the ouija board seven years after his death?

That was the claim put forth by Missouri writer Emily Grant Hutchings who, along with spiritualist Lola Hays, claimed to have communicated with the spirit of Mark Twain via the ouiji board in the composition of an "after death" manuscript titled JAP HERRON. Hutchings, like Sam Clemens, was a native of Hannibal, Missouri. She was the daughter of Carl H. Schmidt, an official of the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railway Company and his wife Margaret, who held the reputation of being one of the first female physicians in the Mississippi Valley. Emily attended the public schools in Hannibal. She later taught Latin, Greek and German, in the Hannibal high school. After leaving Hannibal, she relocated to St. Louis and worked as a feature writer on the St. Louis Republic and contributed to such magazines as Cosmopolitan and Atlantic Monthly. She married Charles Edwin Hutchings in 1897. Twain corresponded with both Emily and her husband Edwin Hutchings in 1902 after visiting St. Louis and advised her on her writing.

Reviews

[trish · Rating 2 out of 5]

meh. wasn’t really invested in what was going on. the deaths weren’t sad, the triumphs weren’t triumphant. there were definitely some highlight moments but between those moments, there was no interesting development. i think the most entertaining bit was the blurb on the back that reads “if this book is the best that ‘mark twain’ can do by reaching across the barrier, the army of admirers that his works have won for him will all hope that he will hereafter respect that boundary.” like okay get his ass 1917 new york times!